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One of the comments to the stories discussed above is worth noting. One correspondent (hydroman from York) gossips:
Not quite in the same class as the Middleham Jewel. I once heard that this was found in Flanders but transported to Middleham to avoid difficulties with French [sic] law.Somebody called "Thundersley" replied:
I think this sort of thing happens a lot more than people like to admit.
Without venturing to judge on the Middleham Jewel case, I agree with the second comment. The truth is many objects entering the record through artefact hunting are found in completely uncontrolled circumstances - even if there are "witnesses" (for example something found when detecting with friends, or during a metal detecting rally) there is still no guarantee that the "finder" did not plant an object they had brought along for the purpose and then pretend to "find". There are of course many reasons why somebody might be motivated to do this. For example the object was found on land where they technically had no right to be, or the agreement over the splitting of proceeds of sale was less favourable to the seeker than that with another landowner. An object may be stolen (Malmsbury coin case) or fake ("Coldfeet" coin cases) or the finder may be seeking kudos - or the find may have been planted for somebody to find by his mates as a joke.
Or there may be cases, as the two commentators above are surmising of the unscrupulous utilisation of England's far too liberal antiquities protection laws to 'launder' artefacts brought into the country as a result of illegal excavation and export elsewhere and then their discovery in England 'staged' in order for the "finder" to be able to sell it openly (and thus for a better price) or receive a reward from the British public purse. There is nothing to say this was not the situation in the case of a number of objects which have commanded high prices on the British antiquities market, to what extent is the British system being utilised in this manner by unscrupulous culture criminals? Can the PAS assure the British public that this never happens, and if it were attempted, every time the FLOs/TU would detect the fraud and nip it in the bud? How many such frauds have been prevented over the past 13 years and 600 000 reported artefacts?
Whatever the answer, this is a loophole that too needs addressing when the Treasure Act is revised.
Photo Middleham Jewel (Yorkshire Museums)
4 comments:
More confusion arises, allegedly, from people bringing items to "club digs" specifically to win the "find of the month" competition!
And on the subject of stuff going into the PAS record that didn't oughta, some hair-raisingly libellous accusations have recently been made on a detecting forum about a holiday detecting company "seeding" fields with exciting finds.
It's all very hard to measure, but I think we can say one thing with a fair degree of confidence: unless nighthawks are crazy they won't try to sell any Treasure items they find, they'll simply change the reported find spot (having first scrubbed the soil away!) and then declare them.
So it seems possible that we're paying rewards for most of the nighthawked treasure items that are found. Or have I got something wrong?
Well, indeed this raises the question where DO nighthawks sell their finds? Since the PAS have started policing eBay, that is obviously too risky, sticking a false provenance on them and splitting the cash with a compliant landowner would seem to be a very real option.
Well just today we have someone on Moneta-L crowing that:
"The English/Welsh TA/PAS approach has, by almost any measure, been enormously successful. The number of reported Treasure finds has increased from an average of 25 per year in the decade before implementation to over 800 in 2008."
So "buying" stuff from the public purse generates lots of takers, I can see that, but I can't quite see how PAS should be given credit for it. I think we taxpayers are the ones that have brought it about.
Nor am I total clear that for the taxpayer to be buying a stolen X% of 800 items is an ideal solution or "enormously successful" - particularly because, surely, offering to fence the gear in such a convenient and risk-free manner is likely to have encouraged the nighthawking. Or have I missed something again? Maybe supply and demand and entrepreneurial risk-management don't apply here?
Who knows what the truth is regarding whether a high proportion of Treasure payouts are to crooks encouraged by Treasure payouts, but isn't it interesting to note that such logical, reasonable concerns, which have to be serious possibilities, are simply not on the official radar!
And certainly not on any "Monetan-L" radar. They just don't get it do they?
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